A tribute to the great Master Hansraj Behl (19 November 1916 – 20 May 1984) on his 105th birth anniversary
A fellow-blogger and SOY regular, Anup (Mehfil Mein Meri), has written an exhaustive series on Lata Mangeshkar’s songs for relatively unknown composers. He did a very sincere job, but some of us were taken aback by inclusion of music directors like Khemchand Prakash, Ghulam Mohammad and Hansraj Behl in the list of ‘unknown’ composers. Khemchand Prakash is among the undisputed greats of the vintage era, and was instrumental in catapulting Lata Mangeshkar to great fame with his Chanda re ja re ja re and Ayega aanewala. Ghulam Mohammad has been well-recognised as an unlucky genius. I have written on both of them. Hansraj Behl has been an equally talented composer whose Chanda gaye pardes chakori aaj ro ro mare (Chakori, 1949) was among the songs that caused Lata Mangeshkar Tsunami in 1949. That was not a flash in the pan, he went on to compose several all-time great songs for her and other major playback singers throughout the Golden Era. Therefore, finding his name among ‘unknown’ composers struck me as odd and I have been intending to write on him since. Yet, I must make it clear that it is not to rebut Anup’s labelling because he explained that for many in the new generation, their awareness does not go beyond the most famous names.